Rare celestial object sighted over Bengaluru skies

An image of Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS) captured in North Bengaluru early on Saturday.
| Photo Credit: Deepak Choudhary

Over the last couple of days, the Bengaluru skies have been witnessing a rare celestial event as a non-periodic comet has been visible in the early hours of the day.

The comet which has been spotted over the city skies is Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS). Discovered by the Purple Mountain Observatory in China on January 9, 2023, it was independently observed by the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) in South Africa a month later which led to its naming.

An image of Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS) captured in North Bengaluru early on Saturday.
| Photo Credit:
Deepak Choudhary

Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS) is a non-periodic comet which according to R.C. Kapoor, a Bengaluru-based astrophysicist, means “they are virtually outsiders to our solar system”. Prof. Kapoor said that the comet passed its perihelion midnight of September 27/28 last from a distance of 56 million km from the sun. He added that it will remain a morning object in the first few days of October.

Images of the comet over the Bengaluru skies have also been captured by amateur photographers and astronomy enthusiasts.

Deepak Choudhary, an avid astronomy enthusiast, had captured images of the comet on Saturday between 5 a.m. to 5.30 a.m. “On the morning of September 28, I woke up at around 4.30 a.m. to check the clarity of the skies and, to my delight, found them perfectly clear. After setting up my DSLR camera and a 20-year-old lens mounted on a tripod, I began capturing images of the sky,” Mr. Choudhary said. He added that on his first attempt, he was overjoyed to see Comet C/2023 A3 appear on his screen. “It is a remarkable achievement, as it may be the first time someone from India captured the comet so closely after its reappearance in the northern hemisphere,” he added.

While the comet will remain a morning object in the first few days of October, from October 12, it will be possible to view in the western sky soon after sunset. “From October 12, it will be possible to view in the west soon after sunset. It will then be passing by the Earth at its closest, when it is expected to be visible by the unaided eye,” Prof. Kapoor said.

Prof. Kapoor added that as the eccentricity of this comet’s orbit is slightly above one, it is an Oort Cloud object.

“Such objects are on extremely long orbits. The Oort Cloud is a reservoir centered on the Sun, extending from ~10,000 to ~100,000 au (astronomical units) with comet orbits randomly oriented; 1 au= 149,597,870.700 km,” Prof. Kapoor added.